'Lee Cronin's The Mummy' Review: The Exorcist in Egypt, Wrapped in a F**ked Up Bandage Bow
- 6 minutes ago
- 3 min read
By Seb Jenkins - April 16, 2026
For those who were worried that Lee Cronin would get lost in the sauce of The Mummy franchise, worry not. What he serves up is shocking, bloody, and downright putrid.
Did you know there are now 16 films in The Mummy franchise, with a 17th on the way in 2028? No? Me neither! From Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy to the Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, generations of archaeologists have been tormented by our pesky bandaged antagonist. But trust me, Lee Cronin does not pander to anything that comes before. That means no Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson CGI, no giant Imhotep sand mouth, and not a Tom Cruise in sight. Instead, Cronin unwraps the story to its skin and bones to create something far more horrifying than any of its predecessors.
For anyone hoping to tune into The Mummy and find an action-packed Rick O’Connell adventure, with the bad-ass Rachel Weisz and comic relief from John Hannah, look away now. Lee Cronin’s reimagining of the iconic monster is unsettling, skin-crawling, and gutsy in equal measure. When the young daughter of reporter Charlie (Jack Reynor) and his wife, Larissa (Laia Costa), goes missing, the Canon family is thrown into an eight-year mire of trauma and torment. But when Katie reappears in Egypt, the jubilation is short-lived. This is not the little girl they left behind almost a decade ago. She is someone else… something else.
The Mummy lives and dies (and resurrects?) on the fantastically distressing performances from Costa and Reynor. The helpless mother and father instantly ground us into Cronin’s dark and bloody world. Even the peaks of humour serve only as rollercoaster climbs for the inevitable gut-wrenching troughs. Perhaps the star of the show is Natalie Grace though, who delivers an Exorcist-worthy performance as the possessed Katie. Spine-chilling does not do it justice.
The Mummy thrives on the fact that it relies not on jump scares (which are a dime a dozen in the demon-possesses-child-and-or-house genre), but on heightened family trauma, unsettling body horror, and sheer parental desperation. Throw in some wonderfully grotesque make-up, clever practical effects, and sparingly used CGI, and you have the ingredients of a compelling, intense, and bloody disgusting horror. New Line Cinema could have gone Hollywood with this latest iteration, but succeeded in opting for something more grounded, intimate, and, therefore, genuinely frightening on an immersive level that endless special effects simply cannot tap into. Any lovers of blood, guts, and imaginative death scenes, strap in. Haters of toenails, look away now.
Unfortunately, the one area in which The Mummy lets itself down is the final act. Cronin somehow sticks the landing with a poetic climax, before taking the plane back up and going for a second jump. If ending one was a bullseye, then ending two was a splatter on the pavement. Cut the 133-minute run time by 20 minutes and take a rusty hacksaw to the finale that feels like a desperate reshoot, and you could have the makings of a cult classic.
But even with all that, Cronin and co should be commended on a job well done. Rehashing a tried-and-tested IP is a tale as old as time, but he manages to rehash, and slash, and bite, and slice, and squelch his way to something simultaneously fresh and rotten. Like if The Exorcist and Evil Dead Rise had a baby called Katie and raised it in Cairo, Lee Cronin’s The Mummy is worth getting wrapped up in.
'Lee Cronin's The Mummy' is out in cinemas on April 17, 2026.
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